As the title says, I’m feeling pretty burnout. I guess what I really need, is to recharge. Off to get some shut eyes now. Am hoping to wake up feeling more refreshed. =) Every now and then, we all need to just find some solitude.

- whit3puppy

Una de mis secciones favoritas del canal VH1 corresponde precisamente a cuando juntan algunas de las primeras canciones de un artista, con la última novedad de la persona en cuestión. No sé si siguen haciendo este programa, pero si lo hacen, mirarlo, porque merece la pena.

Ya ha salido el nuevo videoclip de Norah Jones (Chasing pirates)… y he pensado que no vendría mal hacer un now and then de ella porque, a pesar de que la música sigue la misma línea (cosa que me alegra, que no se haya dejado vencer por las disqueras como ha hecho Nelly Furtado…) lo que sí se puede ver en sus videoclips es que tienen más dinero para hacer cosillas.

Aquí va el now and then de Norah Jones:

Norah Jones – Don’t know why (2002):

Norah Jones – Chasing pirates (2009):

I go to the library today to pick up a book that had come in, and find a cart of movies for a buck a piece. The library’s trying to sell me something? C’mon. For one dollar? …okay, let’s take a look.

Peering at the spine titles, I am instantly brought back to the 90s. For one thing, all the movies are on VHS. This is kitsch worth keeping. And I will look forward to the day my children will ask me, among other things, what VHS and cassette tapes are.

Apollos 13. Nine months. My Girl 2. Entrapment. Good Morning Vietnam. This is like walking through a Blockbuster when I was eleven. Okay, I tell myself, just pick one.

And then I see it: Now and Then, in the tacky block lettering that everyone used to pick for their school projects. I watched Now and Then around the same time that The Babysitter’s Club came out, and though at the time I didn’t realize it was a coming-of-age movie, all I remember was liking that teenage girls could take their bikes every day and ride wherever they wished to, singing along to a tiny radio strapped to the handles. That, and also the fact that Rosie O’Donnell was the Ellen DeGeneres of afternoon talk shows, and Christina Ricci was still cool from her leading role in Casper.

Best one dollar I’ve spent in a while. Now and Then. On VHS. Mine. Forever.

Hey there! Do you ever wonder what you really want? I beg to disaggree with popular opinion when they say that “Girls dont know what they want”. I think they do know what they want. And I also think that they choose to always put their wishes behind. They compromise. They put themselves second. They let the other person be happy. They believe in the bigger picture. They smile so the other person can feel good. They cry alone. They bounce back. They keep mum. And they make it look all so easy! This one is to all the girls of the world who love unconditionally, live like there is no tomorrow and give more than they ever wish to receive. I too feel that I have put somethings behind and compromised so the other person can feel at ease. Its for the larger good and Iam ok with it. After all giving is more important than receving right? (I see you are giving me a smiling nod) Ok time to lighten up!

For me “Gorgeous Girlie” life is about luxury, comforts, enjoying my earnings and getting my bearings after I slog it out. I do like indulgence infact Iam a strong believer in the power of pampering. I like things the way I do. If I want chocolates on my birthday they have to be Patchi, if its good Italian food, its Trattoria at The Taj President. No am not a sucker for brands but I do appreciate fine quality and am willing to shell out the bucks every now and then. Iam always someone who would pay more and get the stuff that lasts rather than buy lots for less and then keep running back to buy more. I wonder how you shop? Do you shop from the street or High Street? Is it brands that bring you to the store or its the stuff no matter where, no matter what? Tell me, because I wanna know. The best shopping story wins a prize. Hurry!

In 1983 Frederick Buechner was arguably at the height of his literary career—two years removed from a Pulitzer nomination for the visionary Godric, one year removed from his NYT-lauded memoir The Sacred Journey, and his chronicles of Leo Bebb’s adventures were still fresh. It’s refreshing when looking back the second of his memoirs, Now and Then, to glimpse the humanity that Buechner wore so humbly and openly.

The book details his life from his decision to enter seminary (and briefly halt a promising writing career) to what was then the present.  He primarily focuses on some of his time teaching religion at Exeter and some of the sources for his popular novels.

Rather than an exhaustive, self-aggrandizing approach, Buechner offers only 100 pages, noting that sometimes it’s the rare moment that seems insignificant at the time that turns out to be most significant.  So the book is structured around such remembrances.

In 1982 writer Reynolds Price wrote, “Spiritual autobiography in general has suffered from too much spirituality and too little biography (Augustine’s ”Confessions,” for instance, confess far too little and sermonize too much); it is Buechner’s big strength that he is so lucidly particular.”

Buechner tosses off gentle, economical wisdoms in poetic observations:

• “I have always believed it is not so much their subjects that the great teachers teach as it is themselves” (12).
• On why love in Christianity is different than love in Buddhism: “…pain is so much a part of the love that the love would be vastly diminished, unrecognizable, without it” (56).
• On a former professor: “His faith was not a seamless garment but a ragged garment with the seams showing, the tears showing, a garment he clutched about him like a man in a storm” (16).

He also takes on some theological issues, like the differences between Christianity and Buddhism and the honest approach to God that some like Camus and Sartre and Kierkegaard took though he differs with their take.

His heart is for taking an honest assessment of the self and for dropping the phony language that sometimes surrounds discussions of faith.  Thankfully, because we beautiful insights like this one:

“…in the long run what is good about religion is playing the way a child plays at being grown up until he finds that being grown up is just another way of playing and thereby starts to grow up himself. Maybe what is good about religion is playing that the Kingdom will come, until—in the joy of your playing, the hope and rhythm and comradeship and poignance and mystery of it—you start see that the playing is itself the first-fruits of the Kingdom’s coming and of God’s presence within us and among us” (73).

Even when Buechner is most blunt, the tone feels like preaching and more like someone trying to help you out. “There is no event so commonplace but that God is present within it, always hiddenly, always leaving you room to recognize him or not to recognize him, but all the more fascinatingly because of that, all the more compellingly and hauntingly…listen to your life…in the last analysis all moments are key moments, and life itself is grace” (87).

Sadly, Buechner’s perch atop the literary world was precarious and short-lived.  He continues to publish, Yellow Leaves released in 2008, and to be studied, but his novels were not recognized again as Godric was.  Beuchner seemed keen to this in the closing pages of Now and Then, noting that his books “never reach as wide a public as I would like—too religious for secular readers, I suspect, and too secular for religious ones” (108). Both crowds would benefit from more  Buechner.

Buechner in 2002 discusses vocation:

Luella was 1960’s cute and girly this season.  Little Lolita dresses with heart shaped cut outs and short jackets made for a youthful, conservative look. The collection reminded me of a mix between Blair’s wardrobe in Gossip Girl and the 4 girls in the movie Now and Then. City girls in the summer, window shopping, going to the movies and sitting at a sidewalk cafe drinking iced coffee.

Luella

It is 1 am, Tuesday morning.

The neon blue screensaver mode on my laptop is hardly remarkable while the light switched on.

When I switch the lights off, things change. The light of a blue straggler floats airily on my desk, pausing in its journey across space-time and light-years. It is cryptically futuristic, illuminated against the cat-yowling, car honking, civet-hissing night. It gives one haughty neon wink, then blinks out of existence.

There is a sudden silence as the hum of my laptop dies off.

Hoje  estava vendo um filme de 1993, que tinha uma paixãozinha platônica. Rá! Então resolvi relembrar das paixonites dos anos 90. A começar pelo do filme de hoje.

Omri Katz
Filme: Abracadabra (1993)
Papel Memorável: Max Denisson
Recurso: O virgem que acendeu a vela de chama negra.

Devon Sawa
Filme: Gasparzinho (1995), Now and Then (1995).
Papel Memorável: Casper, Scott Wormer.
Recurso: Lembra-se quando ele desceu a escada como forma humana Casparzinho para dançar com Christina Ricci?

Leonardo DiCaprio
Filme: Romeo and Juliet (1996), Titanic (1997).
Papel Memorável: Romeo, Jack Dawson.
Recurso: Ele era tão bonito. Que cabelo! “Oh Jack!”

It’s been very busy at work lately…and in unexpected ways. Some agencies I’ve been trying to either get in with or get in with more have been less responsive than I would like, but then others have come through with some great jobs. So I’ve had several more realtime throwdown successes, which have been very exhilarating. It’s partly the RT aspect and partly the new steno ideas that keep this job interesting! I’ve also had a couple SNAFUs, of course. With each new technology comes a dozen new ways for it not to work, right?!

I’ve really been enjoying my online friends and looking forward to seeing many of them at the next annual convention. Sounds like I missed a great time by not attending this year’s convention! Alas, there were other things on the burner.

Last but certainly not least, both kids seem very happy! That makes me happy.